” said a statement from Oxfam India, an NGO committed to empowering the poor and marginalized sections. According to findings, about 70 per cent of the women investigated in Rajasthan had their uterus taken out, it claimed adding a recent Right to Information (RTI) plea also revealed that a large number of the women who had undergone the procedure were under the age of 29.

What is even more alarming is the fact that the youngest patient to undergo such a procedure is just 18 years old and in spite of the fact that complaints have been made to the police and local Government, no action has been taken to investigate the case further said the NGO.

“I said I don’t want an operation done to me, but they said I had to have one and they charged me for it. I managed to borrow some money. I only finished off paying my debts two months ago from my first child who is now nine years old,” said an old village woman in Rajasthan.

In the national capital Delhi, the Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare admits the practice of the menace and says even in the past reports had come from several provinces (states). “This is an issue of great concern. The Government is seized of the matter and in fact directed the provincial Governments last year to keep a vigil,” a senior official in the Health Ministry said.

Symptom of the malady Five doctors of a private hospital in Bandikui in Rajasthan, accused of removing uterus illegally, in 2011 had gone on a strike. For each hysterectomy, removal of uterus, the doctors allegedly charged from Rs 12,000 to Rs 14,000. “I said that my children are small and don’t remove my uterus but they said that the operation is necessary and removed it,” complained one patient. In another case, a patient said, “I went to the doctor because I had heavy bleeding during menstruation. An ultrasound was quickly done and was told that I might develop cancer. Then, the next day I was admitted and a hysterectomy was done”. In Bihar, another patient complained that she was reluctant to have the operation and wanted to discuss it with her husband but the doctor refused to wait and the surgery was done. In yet another case, in Samastipur district in Bihar, initial figures suggested that more than a third of operations carried out under the scheme were hysterectomies. The district administration was so distressed that the magistrate became so concerned about these figures that he invited women who had had the operation to attend a government medical camp.

Sources also said that the ill practice is nothing new and that in the year 2011 itself, in Rajasthan’s Dausa district within a span of six months three hospitals in a small town called Bandikuian had conducted 385 operations on women patients and of these more than 220 were to remove uteruses.

Officials also say that only after the Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad had intervened, a probe had been ordered into such irregularities in States like Chhatisgarh and Bihar last year.

In the eastern State of Bihar, irregularities were reported from at least 11 districts including higher aberrations from Madhubani and Samstipur districts. “The general refrain has been that private institutions have been indulging in hysterectomies (womb operations) only to garner financial benefits under the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana (National Health Insurance Policy). The national health insurance scheme RSBY was launched in 2008 by the Central Government to help the rural poor and under the scheme, families living below the poverty line can receive treatment worth up to Rs 30,000 rupees each year from designated (listed) private hospitals, which claim the money from the Government.”

The opposition parties in various States from Bihar to Rajasthan are calling it a big time scandal and claiming an unholy nexus between State Government officials and private hospitals. “This is a big racket where the Government hospitals and the private hospitals are involved. So, there should be a proper committee to investigate into the matter. We demand that the State Government should form a committee to look into efforts being made towards covering up the issue,” BJP Rajasthan spokesperson Suman Sharma said.

It may be noted here that for each hysterectomy (removal of uterus) the doctors allegedly charged between Rs 14,000 to Rs 20,000.

The opposition leaders also cite a bizarre situation in Rajasthan wherein doctors of private hospitals accused of removing uterus illegally, had gone on a strike in 2011 and 2012.

Durga Prasad Saini, an advocate in Rajasthan said: “Whatever abdominal stomach problems they are coming to doctors with, the doctors scare the patients by saying that they have cancer and are going to die. They mislead the women into undergoing surgery even though it is not necessary. This is for sheer greed of money.”

In view of these revelations, Araddhya Mehtta, Oxfam’s global health campaigner, has cautioned private investors to be more careful while investing in the private sector health care. “In many poor countries we are seeing people trapped in poverty because of health care fees, or dying through lack of treatment because they are too poor to pay. The real solution is to make sure government health facilities are offering free, decent medical care, available to everyone,” Mehtta said.

Swati Deb